Ellsworth Moment!

I have a lot of blogging to do to update, but this one is the freshest and, therefore, the most exciting!

July 6, a Monday, Connie and I got our new Ellsworth frames. Ellsworth is the new Velo Bella title sponsor, and they make amazing frames, handmade in the USA.

We were excited. Obviously.

Connie got a Dare, the downhill frame, with 9 inches of delicious squishy travel. I, per my previous post about quasi-retiring from downhilling for this season, got a Moment, a 6 inch trailbike, so that I can still race Super D and get local girls to try it out as well during our girl's nites.

Is that a happy Connie?


I think she likes it!


I was so nervous to pull mine out of the box.


Can I leave the plastic on it forever? It's so pretty - I don't want to scratch it.


Wow!


Now, I received some of the parts, but not all. Key components still missing: crankset (going with a Hammerschmidt), wheels, and fork. Hmm, can't really ride without those, eh? Wheels were coming a week later, fork a couple weeks, Hammerschmidt? 30 days, minimum. Ouch!

After a week, I couldn't wait. Ding ding! Lightbulb went on.....I can cannibalize my Kona Dawg! Pshaw on selling it right away, let's use some parts!

Monday and Wednesday nights, I was a bike mechanic. The blank slate:




(Yes, that is our garage, I give you permission to be jealous. Almost a full shop in there...LOVE it. Took a lot of time and work, but it's pretty sweet now.)

I had a spare bottom bracket and crankset, so that went on first.


Stole the rear wheel and derailleur from the Kona Dawg, and threw a new chain on. Started to look like a bike!


Then, Brad took it to a shop while I was at work and had them install the headset (the only thing I didn't have the tools to do). When I got home Wednesday night, it was ready to finish.

Getting it to the next step was difficult. Wanted to put wider bars on than I received, and happened to have a nice pair from last year, but then the stem that came wouldn't fit. So, I scrounged up a DH stem and put it on. Kind of a funny combination, but it'll work! Getting closer...


Funny story: the head tube on the fork was too long since it was cut for the Dawg, so it needed a lot of spacers. Between the spacers on the Dawg and the spacers in my drawer, there still weren't enough, so I had to cannibalize my dirt jumper to steal some spacers. Here you can see how many spacers there are on the bike!


More drama: The new brakes (Avid Codes, which are awesome) were set up for 8" rotors, and the Dawg wheels came with 6". So, I had to steal the brake adaptors from the Dawg. Then, I don't usually run two chainrings in the front, so I didn't have any spare front derailleurs. The spare crankset, however, had two chainrings. Suddenly, the poor Dawg was stripped of its front derailleur. Originally, I intended to lock the derailleur into place as a defacto chainguide, then at the last minute decided to add the shifter.

Finally, after messing around with the shifters and derailleurs, installing cable and housing, grips, a new rear tire, adjusting the saddle, it's a whole bike! It even shifts smoothly, which is impressive for me, since my big weakness is adjusting shifting.

Is this not the lovliest thing you've ever seen? I'll be keeping this forever. Well, once it gets its own parts of course....


And the poor Dawg, originally only going to lose wheels and fork, ended up stripped almost to the frame. This picture is misleading, since I have the original front wheel sitting there but in reality the Dawg lost both wheels (the original front was replaced by a Stans NoTubes wheel from last year).


Good news as of Thursday:

• Stans wheels are out for delivery, so hopefully we'll have them at Nationals this weekend
• Magura Wotan fork is being shipped today or tomorrow so hopefully I'll have it next week
• Ordered a pink SRAM derailleur and shifter to replace the ones shipped from Ellsworth (a last minute decision, but will look beautiful) that will be here next week

So, I can reassemble the Dawg and sell it soon, which is exciting, and even MORE exciting, upgrade the Franken-bike to a Moment in all its glory. I'll keep you posted...